After Death
by Dorano1
Summary: After Fred's death, George couldn't cast a Patronus. After Fred came back, he didn't need to.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:** While contemplating the twins (and the Weasleys in general) I came up with this little idea. I may write more, I may not, depending on the reception.

* * *

 **After Death**

Fred.

Was.

Bored.

 _Soeffingbored._

This didn't bode well for anyone. But who would have thought death could possibly be boring?

Yet, it was. There wasn't anyone he knew here. That was a good thing, of course — he didn't want his friends and family to die. But the downside of being the only Weasley casualty of the war was that there wasn't anyone to pass the time with.

In the two years of the Battle of Hogwarts, Fred had driven the gatekeeper mad by refusing to go either forward or backward. He'd been two busy exploring (and causing mischief, to nobody's amusement but his own). Often, he'd look to one side to share a laugh with George — until he remembered he was dead, and George was not.

It was a bittersweet ache, because George, his twin brother and best friend, was alive and living and laughing (at least, he'd better be, or Fred would have some serious words with him), and Fred was happy for that, but he missed his brother. And he felt guilty for missing him, because he really didn't want his brother to know what dying was like. Because it sucked.

No, really, he just wished he could be alive again, at George's side.

"When you put it like that, why are you still here?"

Fred jumped, spinning around to face the direction the voice came from. Sitting on the ledge across from her was a young woman in Hogwarts robes, the Hufflepuff crest emblazoned proudly on the front. She looked vaguely familiar, somehow.

"Who are you?" He asked, wary of unexpected new things here, but desperate for something to break the monotony.

Because moving on without George wasn't an option, but the waiting room wasn't the most engaging place ever. To put it mildly.

"Maddie Broekhart," she introduced herself, studying him like he was a particularly interesting Arithmancy problem. "I guess you don't remember me. I'm not surprised. It was a long time ago."

Fred shook his head. He was _trying_ to remember, but he just...couldn't place her.

"Our second year, you and your brother were in the library trying to finish a Herbology essay. Normally you would have just ignored it, but George was really interested in the subject so you went with him to help him. You both got stumped, but you were too stubborn to ask for help." Maddie expanded, watching Fred to see if he got it.

And just like that, he could see the girl in front of him as an awkward twelve-year-old in pigtails, grinning across the library table at them. Offering help.

"So why are you here?" He asked. One encounter? That was all? One time helping with homework, and suddenly this?

Maddie Broekhart shrugged. "I'm not just here for you. But sometimes people need help moving on - or going back. That's what I do. I help people." A ghost of a smile (no pun intended) touched her face. "I am a Hufflepuff, after all."

Fred's mind was racing. He could see George again, and Ron and Mum and Dad and Ginny and Bill and Charlie and Percy -

"Can I come back?" He asked hesitantly. "In a few years - " _decades, hopefully_ "when I'm...ready?"

Maddie grinned. "Of course you can."

Fred went back.

Maddie smiled. "And here I thought loyalty was a Hufflepuff thing."

* * *

Five decades later, Fred came back. But he wasn't alone.

George Weasley, looking not a day older than he had during the Battle of Hogwarts, was at his side.

Maddie Broekhart smiled at them, and led the twins - the twins, who were inseparable even by death - through the gates, to the rest they so deserved.


	2. Chapter 2

Two years after the Battle of Hogwarts, George closed the door of Weasley's Wizard Wheezes behind him and exhaled slowly, looking around the deserted kitchen — Ron must be asleep or out with Hermione. He managed a bit of a smile.

Angelina was a welcome bright spot in his life. It was strange, dating the woman his twin brother had liked —

 _Oh, God, Fred…_

George squeezed his eyes shut in an effort to drive back the tears — and the memories — but it wasn't any more effective than it usually was.

 _Spells are flying through the air, but none of them are touching him because how could they? Fred is by his side, and together they are invincible._

 _Until they aren't._

 _"Fred!" He shouts, looking wildly around for his missing twin. He can't find him, he can't find Fred, where is Fred_ —

 _Part of the seventh floor explodes, and George drops to his knees, the breath knocked out of him. No curse has touched him, and yet he feels as though he's just been torn to pieces._

 _Instantly, instinctively, he knows his twin brother is dead._

George jolted back to the present, finding himself sitting in a heap on the floor, his back to the door, shaking with silent sobs. He stayed that way for a while, carefully piecing himself back together. He should have known better than to think about his brother's school years.

Fred Weasley had died in the Battle of Hogwarts.

Part of George Weasley had died with him. Some days it seemed like a large part, other days, a smaller part.

He functioned in normal society, the way a person might function without an arm or a leg or an eye…

 _Or an ear?_

He almost laughed aloud.

Sometimes Ron would tell him a story from his Auror-years (there were exactly two) or Ginny would complain about reporters, and he'd laugh and look to one side to see Fred's reaction, to share a smile and a chuckle because that's what they did, and then he'd remember his twin brother, his best friend, was dead.

Slowly, the parts slid back together, and George pulled himself up into a standing position. He glanced anxiously at the ceiling, hoping that Ron — if he was home — hadn't heard anything.

"You're a bloody wreck, you know that?"

George nearly took off his other ear in surprise. It sounded like — but it couldn't be —

It was.

There was Fred, same crooked grin, same mischievous eyes. It was like looking in a mirror — except Fred had an extra ear, was see-through, and was floating.

George stared.

Fred tipped his head to one side.

George stared.

Fred stared back. "Boo."

George tackled him.


End file.
